


Like Northern Light Into My Darkness

by Kendrene



Series: These Celestial Instruments [1]
Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Angst, Blood and Gore, Developing Relationship, Eventual Happy Ending, Eventual Sex, Eventual Smut, Explicit Language, F/F, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Psychological Trauma, Slavery, Temporary Blindness, Torture, alternative universe
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-04-08
Updated: 2016-06-09
Packaged: 2018-06-01 02:35:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,330
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6497446
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kendrene/pseuds/Kendrene
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.”<br/>- 2 Corinthians 4:18</p>
<p>After Lexa's betrayal at Mount Weather, Clarke is running from demons she can't escape. Run too long from your inner ones, and you will face those in the flesh. She doesn't know she is being hunted until she is captured by the Azgeda warriors. What does the Ice Queen plan to do with her? </p>
<p>Lexa embarks on a journey to find her, bargaining with the souls of the Commanders residing inside her, desperate to save the Coalition and make amends to the one she has started to love.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Dreadful Sagittary

**Author's Note:**

> In cycles I will go through these waves of angst about losing my eyesight. Sometimes it is hard to endure, but writing is being a big release. 
> 
> I won't lie, this story will be angsty, but there is happiness at the end. I hope you will bear with me. These words needed to go somewhere. Please, take them from me. 
> 
> Kudos and comments are always welcome. Thank you for taking the time to read what I write.

 

“ _You not only are hunted by others, you unknowingly hunt yourself.”_

Dejan Stojanovic – _The Sun Watches The Sun_

 

The childlike wonder and delight at the lazy flakes of snow, quickly turn to frustration as the ground becomes treacherous, and then despair when Clarke realizes she is utterly lost.

The warmth of Nylah’s body against her own is lingering only in her thoughts, the temporary relief she offered to the dull ache inside her chest, trickling away with each step. Wrath heats her up for an instant, so blazing she imagines it could melt the snow around her. The deep cut of Lexa’s betrayal exposes her to the elements; she is flotsam at sea, thrown this way and that by the furious waves of her impotent rage, the salt of their touch scrimshawing the Commander’s parting words onto her bones.

Following the hart’s tracks had seemed like a good idea, another way to keep moving, to occupy her empty hours with something other than pain. It did not matter she had just restocked. There was only so much she could carry on herself, and she always could use more supplies.

She raises her gaze to the heavens and the snow, heavier now, stings her open eyes. The sky is a slate of darkening gray, heavy with clouds that will stay long into the night. She sighs, resigned, and trudges through shifting drifts of snow, until she finds a suitable spot, away from the icy wind where she can settle down to wait.

She has a flint and kindling in her pack, and it does not take long to have a small fire going. It does not amount to much in the way of warmth, but it casts a bit of light onto her solitude, and for that she is grateful. Part of her aches at the loneliness, thoughts circling and gnawing upon themselves when she is awake, guilt and anger chasing her around when she sleeps, yet human contact proves almost too painful to endure. The release she experienced with Nylah was naught but a temporary balm. Clarke feels like a weeping wound, torn and scraped raw, and she does not know if the ache will ever cease. It is the same kind of quiet desperation that drove her away from friends and safety. She cannot look upon the spirited faces of the living, without the empty ones of the dead coming to haunt her.

She loses herself in the brightness of the fire, tongues of reddish flame licking upwards, the kindling splintering slowly with soft pops. The flakes of snow that fall in the fire make it hiss, glinting like shards of glass before melting away.

Clarke does not know how long it takes, but the snow abates at first, becoming smaller sleet, the fatter flakes few and far between, then it stops completely.

She stands and looks around, the beauty of the landscape sinking in to touch her deeply, past the walls she is so desperately trying to erect around herself. The world is cocooned under a glistening white blanket that muffles all sound, the lay of the land gentled into softer, rounder curves. There should be no light in the dead of night as the moon is in the process of hiding its face, yet an ethereal glow fills the air, and she can clearly see the bewildered hand she lifts in front of her eyes.

She tilts her head back, breath curling gently in the frigid temperature, and is greeted by the velvet blackness of the night sky. The stars shine down on her coldly, and the hope of navigating her way through them, dies in her heart. They look so different from the ground, all askew in disposition. Before, when she was with the others, she did not need them, trusting the familiarity of the woods around the drop ship, and later Camp Jaha to guide her home, but she has strayed so far in the fervor of the hunt, that this place is unfamiliar, uncharted territory not unlike the broken mess inside her.

One star, brighter than the rest beckons, and she knows it instantly for the celestial compass she read about som many times, the one light in the sky that will point travelers unerringly towards the North. Following a whim, Clarke starts walking, her eyes never leaving the pinprick of pure white that punctures the darkness. She keeps them wide open, to the point they start to weep, yet she persist, as purpose fuels her march. She does not care much for the direction, the demons she is running from will snap at her heels for quite a long time.

When she comes upon the hart, she is caught entirely by surprise. She wills herself to stillness, slowly lowering down into a crouch and watches as the proud head, crowned by antlers that look as old as the trees behind them, lifts and the animal sniffs the wind. Its hide is as white as the snow, the bottomless eyes and nose the only splash of color. Clarke carefully unlimbers her bow, and nocks a goose feathered arrow, drawing the bowstring to press against her lips, her arm shaking with tension. Maybe it smells her, or the bow creaks softly when put to use, but the beast darts away just as the bolt flies to where it stood an heartbeat before.

Clarke lowers the weapon and finds she does not regret missing the target, feeling the creature was so gracefully pure she had truly no right to tarnish it with her violence.

A branch snaps behind her back, bent too far by the wind perhaps, then a rough rope is flung around her neck and tightens, cutting at the soft skin of her throat, squeezing the next breath out of her. The bow tumbles away from her slackened grasp and she is hauled backwards with a forceful jerk.

Her body meets the ground hard, and a hail of kicks rains down along her ribs, bruising her deeply. Hands go around her collar and she is dragged forwards and up, coming almost nose to nose with the hard angles and scarred cheekbones of a man's face. He looks built for violence, hulking and vehement as he shakes her with a satisfied grunt, stone gray eyes alight with ill will. Without thought, Clarke rears back, then her head snaps forwards, brow colliding with his nose, in a crunch of splintering bone. Blood showers her face and she sees one of his fists draw back, even as his eyes slit in pain for a moment, ready to repay her with the same coin.

A hand, slim and feminine, closes around his wrist, tendons standing out starkly, yet the motion is stopped without apparent effort.

“No,” a woman's voice restrains, rimmed with frost so cold it sets Clarke's teeth chattering, “the Queen's instructions were clear.”

“She _bled_ me!” he growls back, with unhappiness so heartfelt, Clarke detects his disdain for the speaker.

She lets him go, and he almost tears his arm back. “Be honored that you bleed for your clan.”

The hand suddenly grabs her chin, and Clarke's head is whipped around so fast her neck twinges painfully. Eyes of the darkest brown meet blue, and she is presented with a visage so savage and full of dreaded promises, her first instinct is to recoil. The woman senses this, and her hold tightens. Ritual scars dig thin lines on her cheeks and brow, and her hair is severely pulled back, away from her eyes.

When she smiles at Clarke, it is the baring of a snow cat’s fangs and her gaze remains unmoved, like a deep lake, congealed in the grip of winter.

“We finally meet, _Wanheda,_ ” her lips pull back further, and the smile becomes a fixed rictus full of scorn, “welcome to _Azgeda_.”

 

* * *

 

Anya schools her features to stillness as she listen to the scout’s report echoing through the deserted throne room. She stands a step behind the throne, mirrored on the other side by Titus. They have sent so many out, and she has watched hope being leeched from Lexa’s eyes, as each one has come back empty handed. When the man falls silent, her eyes dart to the Commander’s hands, the only part of her she can clearly see. There is a tightening of fingers on the armrests, the soft groan of wood, barely audible, as pressure is exerted.

When Lexa talks, each word is clear cut and precise, her tone coated with the coolness of the Glasslands, far to a North almost inconceivable in its distance, hard and unyielding.

“ _Mochof,”_ is all she says, bundling together thank you and dismissal.

He stands warily, relieved, a touch of fear perhaps marking the quickness of his steps as he leaves their presence. Lexa remains seated, immobile and neither she nor Titus dare disturb her. Anya closes her eyes for a moment, the weight of thoughts she can almost imagine, building up at the back of her skull.

“Titus,” she stands and Anya moves with her, never too far from her shadow. The Mountain is done, and the Coalition restless. There have already been attempts, although the hand behind the perpetrators remains hidden, “bring me the _fleim_ - _vina_.”

He turns so sharply that Anya’s hand automatically drops to the curved hilt of her sword. A number of expressions gallop across the planes of his face, shock, confusion, anger, worry. He settles on the last one, eyes narrowed, mouth stretched into a grimace.

“You wish to attempt a _soujon_?” his blurt is undiluted disbelief, “the common enemy uniting the Coalition is gone, and already the clans grumble about territory and tributes! They circle like vultures. You could be gone for _days_ when we most need you!”

A raised hand, one blink of forest green eyes is all that is required to stop him. Anya does not need to see her face, to picture the expression she has seen a hundred times before, chin slightly tilted upwards, a hinted curl, poised at the corner of the mouth, and the eyes, half-lidded, yet daring the speaker to finish whatever it is she does not wish to hear.

Titus swallows. “Your will, _Heda_.” He seems to acquiesce as he bows and goes to carry out the order, but his eyes tell a different story.

“Will you stay with me, Anya?” Lexa’s is the softest whisper, that ripples but does not shatter the quiet of the room.

The woman looks at her and the fleeting image of a much younger version, scrawny and all eyes, hanging on her every word as she shared a story, rises from her memory.

“As always,” a small smile tugs at her lips, and Lexa exhales a breath Anya had not noticed she was holding. She is brittle like thin ice, and, for once, the black circles around her eyes are from tiredness and not war paint.

As they walk together to the Commander’s rooms, Anya allows herself some cautious glances in her direction. Now that they are alone, Lexa’s hands are in constant motion. She tugs at the red shawl looped around her shoulders, adjusts her belt, holds the hilt of her knife for a moment, then repeats the circle anew, until Anya smacks her hands away with an exasperated sigh.

“Stop it,” she growls, even as her gaze softens into kindness.

Lexa pulls slightly apart, her body withdrawing almost imperceptibly. As the gap between her and Anya slightly widens, she manages to make it look like she is walking alone, the one sharing the space with her pure happenstance.

“You do not completely approve,” her voice is the epitome of neutrality.

Their heels clicking on the floor tiles are the only reply for some time, When they come to a stop in front of Lexa’s chambers, Anya turns to face her.

“I am here, no?”

Lexa holds her gaze for a moment, then pushes past her and leaves her to follow.

_I just hope she’s worth it._ The warrior adds silently as she locks the door behind them.

When she turns, the other woman is lighting candles around the room. It is not yet full dark, but the sun has left this side of the tower hours ago, and the light will soon be too scarce for their task.

Titus has followed through, she notices, leaving a delicate bottle on the Commander’s table, among half unrolled parchments and open books. The _flemkepa’_ s absence however, is louder than the hottest argument. He would normally be attending to the Vigil himself, but by leaving only Anya he demonstrates all of his displeasure.

If Lexa is unnerved by the circumstances, she does not show it, save maybe when she pours out a glass of the wine, and her hand trembles slightly, making the crystal _clink_ against the bottle’s rim.

She sets the liquid down. In the soft light of the candle it looks like molten amber, sparks of a deeper orange and red suspended inside. Anya held a similar glass once, when she became second, and she knows it is almost scalding to the touch. In a warrior such as she, it causes visions, glimpses of past and future lives, that serve as half-recalled guidance in crucial times. Those that cannot accept what their spirits show them when awakened by the potent brew, call these remembrances _hallucinations_.

Among the _Natblida_ , the flame serves a different purpose.

She recalls a terrible campaign right after Lexa’s Ascension, when the Reapers burned so many of their villages that she feared _Trikru_ may be mortally wounded. Then one morning, when the mood around the camps had reached a new level of desperate, Lexa had emerged from her tent, giving orders that countermanded those she had issued the night prior so completely that she had been compelled to raise her voice in question, demanding an explanation.

When cornered, Lexa had admitted it had been the past Commanders. They had been in her dreams to offer insight since she survived the Conclave, she had said. Anya had known that the spirit of the dead _Heda_ chose the next and in so doing lived on in them, everyone knew that, but she had imagined it to be a last act for the good of the people, before the soul moved on and was reborn, as it was and always would be for those of the clans. She thought she knew what had happened during Lexa's Ascension. Afterwards she had had to push away the harrowing suspicion that the Commanders shared a different fate, because the thought was too terrible to contemplate.

_Do you talk to them? What are they like?_ She remembers asking, curiosity having the better of her. Lexa had shaken her head. No, there never was any talking on her part, just them pouring their knowledge into her. Unless… unless she repeated the ritual, and took the flame anew into herself.

The soft scrape of buckles coming undone recalls Anya to her duties and she steps behind Lexa quietly, helping her loosen the armor straps she cannot reach alone. After her war gear is removed, she catches her forearm in her hand, squeezing briefly.

“Be careful.”

“I always am.” Anya scoffs inwardly as her Commander, about to step into danger, clasps her arm back,

There is no more to say, so they sit on the floor cross-legged, Anya braced against the bed, and Lexa with her back to her, but close, so she will be able to catch her when the flame takes hold.

Again, just like in the throne room, all that she can see are Lexa’s hands. She watches the white-knuckled grip with which she brings the glass to her mouth. There is half a heartbeat of hesitation, then she empties it in one long draught.

She lowers her arm jerkily and her hold slackens. The glass falls to the carpet with a muffled _thud_ and Anya sees the spasm spread from the nape of her neck down to her lower back, as her body goes rigid for what seems like an eternity, then Lexa crumbles backwards and collapses into her waiting arms.

“ _Gouthru klir_ ,” Anya murmurs.

 

* * *

 

Lexa doesn't show it, but she is unnerved. As she brings the glass to her lips, the details of her Ascension come to her, perfectly clear. Most of all, she remembers waking, shaken by the flame's effects, to find that the companions she had shared so much with would never rise again.

The Commanders have been with her every time she has laid down to rest, since Clarke and _Skaikru_ have so portentously come to her lands. As a result, her nights have been filled with a heavy sense of foreboding. The help the predecessors offer is seldom clear, and at times she feels like she is living in fear of misinterpreting the advice.

Only twice she has ignited the flame, after that fateful night during the Conclave. Once soon after she ascended, when Titus had taught her how to brew it for herself and so many questions had buzzed inside her head.

She refuses to acknowledge why she took it the second time. It is a place of pain she has not intention of revisiting.

She hesitates, the liquid touching her lips, and clears her mind of everything but her purpose, then tosses the wine down in one swallow. This is not the kind of vintage that one sips leisurely in front of a fire.

Her tongue is burned, ash and brimstone coat the insides of her mouth and she feels like smoke is pouring down her throat. The flame ignites inside her, as her body drips with sweat and her heart catches fire. She _falls,_ and her soul is lifted from the anchor of her body.

_When she opens her eyes, Polis is different. The throne room is empty and dark, the pennants and trophies from past wars and conquests stripped away. The air is heavy with the smell of sulfur and the wind that is blowing in fiercely from the open balcony, creates miniature dust devils on the grimy floor._

_Even the throne is gone, so she has nowhere to sit while she waits for them. It is not long before dark shapes resolve from the shadowed spaces between the columns. They step to her in unison, and surround her. They look displeased._

“ _Again you come to us with futile questions, for personal reasons,” one, a male, says. “Are you not tired of wasting your time and ours?”_

_Lexa draws herself up, head high, her face a mask of composure, even as fists ball up at her sides._

“ _I waste no time. If the Ice Queen finds_ Wanheda _and steals her power, the Coalition will end. I_ need _to find her first.”_

_A second glides up to her, insidious like a stalking wolf._

“ _And are reasons of state the only source of your need?” The words are almost sneered._ _Lexa does not need to answer. She has learned very quickly how easily the can read, that heart she guards so closely._

_The First steps forward silently, and she could swear the woman was not among those that came to her a moment before. She is wearing a red scarf much like the one Lexa favors, but her clothes are of a cut she has not seen in any of the clans. The shawl's fringes drag a trail into the dust, and Lexa shivers. Swathed around the First like that, it looks like a funeral shroud._

_Their eyes meet and Lexa lets hers be filled by the burning question she feels weighting on the very tip of her tongue._

_The First almost never speaks, and this time is not different. Instead she turns from her and raises her head to look at the sky outside. Boiling clouds roll by endlessly, pushed by the ripping wind, and lightning sparks illuminate their bellies of a brightness so blinding Lexa has to squint to bear looking. The clouds part for a moment, and below she glimpses the familiar purple-blue of the midnight sky. A different light pulses through, steady and unwavering in its brilliance._

_The First's unreadable eyes find hers again. She points at the star, then at Lexa. Confusion mars the smoothness of her brow, and her mouth draws downward pensively._

“ _What does it mean? She is in the North? Tell me what it means!” The First points at the star again, more urgently then she covers her eyes with the shawl briefly._

Clarke is hurt

_The certainty of the thought hits Lexa like a fist in the stomach. She does not question how she knows, she accepts, as the wheels in her brain start spinning, conjuring and discarding one plan after the other. Suddenly she feels a pain start in her chest, tugging at her heart, spreading to every part of her, and quickly becoming crippling. She doubles over, hands on knees, breath coming in throaty rasps._

“ _Tell me... something....something that makes sense.” Every word she pushes out is a gust of flame up her throat, blistering muscle and tongue alike, charring her teeth. She rallies against the feeling, fighting the inevitable gravity pulling her back into the sheath of her flesh._

_There is a final tug, so painful she thinks she will break in half, and she has to surrender. She goes down snarling, with bared teeth, eyes awash with green fire never leaving the First's face._

_Her lips move finally, but the words seem to take an eternity to reach her._

“ _Polaris,_ " but that is not her name. "G _uide her to you.”_

 

* * *

 

They put her in the box every morning, and pull her out of it only at night. Soon enough, it becomes hard for Clarke to tell how many days have passed since her capture. The moon is no help to her, hidden most of the time behind stormy skies. Whenever the snow relents, and the clouds thin long enough for starlight to shine through, her eyes seek the North Star, finding its unperturbed radiance oddly comforting.

_It's stupid_.

She thinks to herself over and over again, but it's the little things that keep her clinging to sanity. The Ice Nation warriors never speak to her, but she has been immersed in their language enough to understand a few words. The way they talk is angular and cutting, like the scars that adorn their faces and bodies. The consonants are sharp like the ice stalactites after a night of freezing temperatures, the vowels guttural, some howled like the dirge of a wolf, others snarled between clamped teeth.

The only one she has any interaction with, is the woman they refer to as Ontari, and she rather wish she didn't. The first night, as they were tying her up, pulling her arms back so painfully she thought her shoulders would pop from their sockets, her hand had strayed to close to Clarke's mouth and she had bitten down hard, tearing the skin between the thumb and the rest of the hand. Ontari had given her a black eye for her trouble, and ordered her beaten. Then, when she thought the hitting would not stop until she was reduced to a pulp of shivering flesh, they had collared her like a dog, and brought her to camp.

There, the box had made its appearance.

Clarke has never been scared of the dark, hell, she has lived suspended in a black sky most of her life, and there was almost never any light in confinement, but this is different. First of all, the container is so cramped they have to make her curl up impossibly tight to fit her inside it. Then there is her own stench. Even in the Sky Box she was allowed to wash, but all she gets is a splash of water dumped on her head to wake her in the morning, or a wet cloth to wipe her hands and face when they stop to feed her at sunset, and that only if Ontari is feeling charitable.

She swiftly learned to obey the woman to the letter: get in the box too slow, or spill some of your food and you get beaten.

It's the small things that keep her alive, above all else the hate she has for Lexa. When she looks at the star, far above, it seems to her it is getting closer and brighter with every passing day, so she assumes they are going further and further north, and now she is cold all the time. They have given her boots, and fur lined clothes, but she cannot move for hours and when they take her out for feeding and sleep, she feels so frozen inside and out, that the wrong movement would shatter her in a million pieces.

She remembers the moment hope turned to ash into her mouth, the moment Lexa, cool,distant, heartless Lexa had turned away from her and her people, taking the clans with her and leaving Clarke with a lit fuse she didn't know how to snuff out.

_That bitch_.

She curls up even tighter as a sob wracks her body, the feeling of the lever she pulled to end everything etched on the palm of her hand. A soft rap sounds on the lid of the box.

“ _Palartok Klark,”_ Ontari voice is soft, but she has no illusion that it is gentle. Clarke bites the inside of her cheek to stifle a bitter giggle. She remembers - _what day was it? The third, fifth? Did it matter?-_ how strenuously she held her name back, refusing to tell Ontari when the woman asked, first patiently then with violent fists, only to find out it had been all a game and she knew already.

Her train of thought is derailed when the swinging of the box that tells they are moving stops abruptly. _It cannot be sunset already._ Her muscles cramp atrociously, her whole body is drenched in a flash of rancid sweat, as the thought of the beating that will come when the box opens sends her almost over the edge.

She feels a rocking motion, then solid ground underneath, and when she opens her eyes, there are people crowding around her, torches held high.

A woman immediately captures her attention, mostly because Ontari is standing one step behind her in deference. She is older, skin tanned to brown leather by sun and wind, light eyes hard as polished gemstones. On her forehead sits something like a diadem, carved from bone. A crown, Clarke realizes, her eyes growing so wide the white shows completely.

“Is she housebroken yet?” She wrinkles her nose.

“Mostly.”

The Queen grunts, something akin to satisfaction flashing in her eyes. Clarke supposes that's as content as she ever looks.

“Begin the preparations for the ritual,” she orders a servant unseen, “and someone give her a bath. She _reeks._ ”

 

 

 


	2. Inside The House Of Gemini

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> While Clarke undergoes preparations for the ritual mentioned by Nia upon her arrival, she makes an unexpected acquaintance that sends her mind reeling. But is everything as clear as it appears, or is a game of smoke and mirrors being played in the house of Gemini?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know this took a while, but I went through quite a few ordeals of my own lately. I hope you will judge that the wait was worth it. 
> 
> As usual, kudos and comments are super-welcomed! I am thankful that you take the time to read my works, more than I can properly say with these poor words.

_“The captured soldiers should be kindly treated and kept.”_

Sun Tzu - _The Art Of War_

 

Rough hands grab a hold of her arms and lift her out of the box as the Queen walks away, bringing most of the onlookers with her, a mother goose trailed by her newborn . Her body unfurls limply, and if it wasn’t for the men on each side of her, Clarke would fall flat on her face. When her feet touch the snowy ground, her muscles _do_ give way and she slumps between the warriors, as they drag her unceremoniously towards a massive building of timber and stone.

Clarke is surprised they are letting her look around at all, but it seems like, now that they have reached their destination, what she could learn from it does not matter. She is conscious it may very well mean, she is not meant to make it out of here alive, whatever the place is.

The air is brittle with the cold and every gulped breath makes her teeth ache, to the point it feels like they are about to split open. Everything around her is coated in a layer of snow, but her enchantment with it is long gone, replaced with wariness and bitter hatred.

The building itself is as savage as the people that inhabit it, crude wooden idols of wolves and feral snow cats flanking the yawning double doors. A knot of hardened warriors, who had been lazing near the entrance, hurriedly straightens and forms into the semblance of a honor guard for Ontari. As they pass by, Clarke has a chance to study them, noting how different they look from Trikru’s soldier caste. So tall they all but tower over her, they look wild and as glacial as their land, skin hardened by the exposure to harsh elements, hair and beards long and untamed to give them the appearance of bears more than men. Only glimpses of their armor are visible beneath the furs they all wear to ward off the cold, but their axes and swords look wickedly sharp and polished by hard use.

Inside it’s hazy with the smoke of torches and cooking fires, windows and openings few and far between, to keep the howling wind from dispersing warmth. Overhead the wooden logs that form the far-reaching ceiling are blackened by generations of fires, and Clarke is reminded to the Vikings’ feasting halls she read about in her father’s books. The smell of roasting meat wafts to her nose, causing her to bend almost double with cramps brought on by gnawing hunger, but the guards carry her onwards, deeper into what feels like a citadel- sized stronghold.

Servants toil everywhere and she notices how their faces lack the ritual scarring the warriors so proudly display. Some lack the fair coloring of the northern people and she sees tattoos adorn their cheeks and hands, disappearing underneath their simple garments.

_Slaves,_ she realizes, captives from Azgeda’s raids into the southern lands. The contempt in which Trikru warriors hold their northern brethren, the smoldering distrust make more sense to her now, these people the lingering vestige of a war gone, but not forgotten and an uneasy truce.

The laboring slaves clear a path for the small party, even those belonging to her captors’ tribe not daring to lift their gazes off the polished floors. She truly has come to dwell among wolves, Azgeda’s reign that of the preying strong upon the feeble.

Marshalling the tattered shreds of her courage, she lifts her head as they come to a stop in front of a nondescript door.

“What do you want with me?”

Ontari turns, a smirk playing on her lips at finding her prize still has some fire that can be beaten out of her.

“Why _Wanheda_ ,” she steps close, almost nose to nose with the blonde, who tries to recoil but is held in place by the laughing warriors , “you are are the guest of honor.”

“I am not stupid,” the words are blurted out and her eyes screw shut as she shivers, awaiting the inevitable blows. Ontari only presses closer, hot breath tickling her cheek, her lips a sneered touch against her ear as Clarke turns her head away, in a vain attempt to put some distance between them,

“Wandering into our lands wasn’t smart, was it _Klark_?” The woman steps to the side with one last barked laugh and motions curtly towards the door.

The guards push Clarke forward roughly and yank it open, throwing her inside without further hesitation. Her legs weakened by the long hours spent curled inside her wooden prison, she totters then falls forward on her knees, her palms slapping the flagstones hard to avoid crumbling on her face. The stone is uneven and pain stabs up her arms as the skin is scraped and cut.

The door slams shut, the men’s guffaws cut short and she struggles to her feet, using the last reserves of strength to fling herself at the obstacle, putting all her weight behind it. The frame creaks, but does not give and she bangs her balled fists against it in impotent anger, splinters lodging into her tired flesh.

“ _Wanheda._ ” For the first time since her capture, the title is spoken with reverence rather than mockery. Still its meaning - one that Ontari was more than happy to explain - bleeds her heart, the melting, blotted faces of the Mt. Weather dead conjured by her tortured mind anew.

She turns slowly, expecting to find a prison, perhaps an awaiting torturer tricking her with faked kindness.

The room is bare and simple, but clean and lit well enough, far from the horrific dungeon her fantasies had already painted. As for the owner of the voice it is a girl, of an age with her or perhaps, she muses, fighting the exhaustion urging her to slide to the floor, some years older. She lets her gaze linger, not caring about rudeness, and the girl waits patiently, as if used to being appraised so.

_Livestock._

The thought shocks Clarke into averting her eyes, and she lowers her head abashed, letting a dirty curtain of hair fall across her face. The girl is black as tar, where she is fair, olive-skinned and a few inches taller than her. Clarke could not help but notice the strands of white hair among the black, the stunning eyes that made her breath almost catch, grey as thunderclouds, but flecked with honey-gold and a complexion that spoke of a life far different than the slave one the girl lives now.

“ _Wanheda,_ ” there is a rustling of clothes, and when she lifts her gaze, the slave has moved closer, an arm extended in the gesture her voice contains. An invitation, Clarke realizes, noticing the stone bench the stranger is directing her to, and the deep pool of steaming water beyond.

She shuffles forwards warily, keeping a few hands of air between them, clear blue eyes meeting grey and never leaving, and the girl follows, but makes no move to invade her space, treating her as one would a beast of the forest they wanted to get used to their presence.

Her shirt and breeches, Clarke sees, are of a better quality than those she saw on the other slaves, the fabric thicker, with a hint of fur at the collar and cuffs. A servant of rank then, to serve the guest of honor.

She almost lets her contempt show, but harshly reminds herself the girl is here by no fault of her own, and a prisoner as much as she is.

A trembling that starts at her calf and soon has her whole body shaking, reminds her about her frailty and she hastens to the bench, failing to contain an undignified sigh of relief. The girl stops in front of her, hands extended almost touching the laces that close the tunic at her throat, yet waiting for permission on her part.

Refusal at whatever her captors have in mind tempers Clarke’s eyes to blue steel and the girl startles her anew, lowering herself to her knees in submission.

“Allow this one to serve you,” a pleading light enters the slave’s gaze, “if you are not ready when they return, this one will be punished.”

“Ready for what?” Clarke asks, without real hope for an answer. She imagines the girl knows little past the orders she is given.

“You are _Wanheda_ ,” she is told simply, as if the title encased everything she wants to know. Clarke shakes her head with disgust at the name, and a look of confusion crosses the slave’s face.

“You know what it means,” she murmurs slowly, uncertainty dragging at her words.

It isn’t a question, but the blonde feels compelled to nod.

“You are the Commander of Death,” she flinches - the words hurt even more in English than she ever thought possible, “you must know they want your power,” the girl insists, “and the only way to obtain it, is to slay the bearer.”

_Death then._

She slumps forwards slightly and barely notices the slave’s touch, as deft hands begin to undress her

She struggles to come to terms with the truth revealed, as layers of soiled clothes are gently removed, exposing the mistreated flesh beneath, Isn’t it what she wants? To atone for the innocent lives she was forced to take at the Mountain? A sliver of bright anger lodges in her heart, much like the splinters in her knuckles. Another’s hands are stained with the blood she spilled, as she partook in the massacre, if not directly. Blame blossoms like a vine from the seeds of her rage and grips her chest - Lexa’s betrayal set those dreadful events into motion and the Commander should be sitting beside her, sharing the punishment, yet she walked away unscathed, leaving Clarke to be crushed by the jaws of guilt.

Fingers calloused by hard work seek her own, and she is pulled to her feet and out of the recesses of her mind with a start. Her torso has been bared, but before the slave girl can reach for the buttons closing her breeches, she shakes her head with vehemence, a blush splashing her pale complexion with color. Funny that she should feel embarrassment now, after all the humiliation she already has endured.

“I’ll do it,” her voice is hoarse, heavy with dark thoughts. Her hands hurt and it takes her a few tries, but finally the buttons come undone and she lets the trousers fall around her ankles.

The girl gestures towards the hot water pool and Clarke complies, making an effort not to look too eager, even as torn muscles scream for the relaxation the warm liquid will bring.

Clarke lowers herself gingerly into the scalding embrace, with a hiss of pain as pins and needles prick her flesh, and the slave kneels behind her as she settles, back pressed to the edge of the pool, and pours more water over her head, tugging at the knots in her hair.

The foamy liquid around her body turns almost muddy with grime, as her skin is cleansed of days of dirt and neglect, and she feels herself drift off under the slave’s careful hands.

As she watches steam curl upwards through pleasure slit eyes, another thought forms into her mind, insubstantial like the misted air around her at first, then more and more solid as she dwells on it.

If the Azgeda queen wants her so called “power”, let her have it. She has told herself she would tear Lexa’s black heart out herself, but an army of blood-thirsty warriors, led by a woman they believe can conquer even death, seems more apt to the task. The Commander would be weakened, maybe even dealt a mortal blow.

Her shoulders tense as a streak of stubborness surfaces. She _wants_ to see Lexa fall for what she did to her and the people who had called Trikru an ally. Clarke has no illusion that the Ice Nation would be a better master, but a civil war would favor the Sky People, or at least keep the Grounders at each others’ throats long enough for them to bide their time behind sturdier walls.

The woman’s fingers travel to her shoulders and neck, kneading the tension out and she tilts her head back, eyes closed and brow furrowed.

“Let it go,” she is not sure the words are really spoken, or an inner whisper, “whatever it is, let it go.”

Clarke jerks away from the pool’s side and out of the girl’s reach, twisting around, eyes suddenly piercing.

“Why are you telling me these things?”

“So you can surrender,” the answer is disarming in its simplicity, and when the blonde does not reply, the girl continues, “you obviously crave death, otherwise why walk into the arms of your enemies?Whatever you are feeling, whatever you are clinging to will only hurt you more,” she shrugs, and looks down with eyes wise beyond her years, “surrender is easier.”

Clarke bites at her lip pensively, as she perceives a kernel of truth in the girl’s words. As she floats back under her ministrations, a strange quiet descends upon her, a layer like the snow outside, estranging her from the world around her and her own rawness. There is a certain relief in imprisonment she is surprised to find, because she has truly hit rock bottom and there is no lower pit to fall into. She doesn’t have to worry about food or shelter, or fear that Lexa will find her, nor retribution, as it has already found her and her fate rests in hands other than her own.

Could cede control completely, as the girl suggests, be the answer? She is not sure, and yet admitting the alternative is terrifying. To acknowledge that she is so broken by grief, pushed to the point of madness by it, that she craves endless suffering like a drug… she tells herself certain death is punishment enough even as her heart calls out the lie.

When she emerges from the water, the girl is waiting with a towel and she wraps it around herself gratefully, wincing as the coarse cloth scrapes against her bruises.

“What is your name?” she asks, curiosity peaking as she glimpses the shadow of a tattoo on the inside of the slave’s wrist. Familiar patterns and swirls she knows are Triku are black smudges on tanned skin, and despite her newfound will to follow the girl’s advice, she can’t help the hint of warmth somewhere in her chest at the sight of what once felt like home.

“Call this one whatever pleases you, _Wanheda_ ,” the girl shrugs again in a way that tells Clarke she does so often.

The blonde’s lips press into a thin line, “and you stop calling me that,” she snaps back forcefully, realizing that her fires are not quite as extinguished as she would like to think.

The girl lowers her gaze meekly, and she lets herself be dressed in utter silence. The door opens as the last lace of her blouse is being tied, and the slave steps away from her, hurriedly eyes trained to the floor.

Ontari marches inside, and Clarke glimpses the same guards that threw her in the room, waiting beyond the threshold.

She tries not to turn her head as the woman walks leisurely behind her, feeling ravenous eyes pierce her back. Her captor comes to a stop in front of her, and leans close, almost nuzzling into her neck. She inhales deeply, then throws a pleased, cold smile in the slave’s direction.

“Presentable,” she reaches for a lock of Clarke’s hair and twirls it lazily around her fingertips, “she does not smell like her own shit anymore.” She gives her back to the blonde and strides to the girl, cupping her chin and tilting her head back, lips a breath away from her mouth, “you did well Costia.” Abruptly, the slave is pulled forward roughly, Ontari’s armor pressing painfully into her unprotected body, as the woman’s knee nudges up against her groin. The girl winces, seemingly making herself smaller, hurt not by the attention, Clarke realizes, but by the name the woman used.

Ontari’s hands grab her more forcefully, certainly leaving prints on her arms, then the slave is pushed away so hard she has to fight for balance on stone made slippery by the condensed heat.

“I will find you in my chambers after the feast,” the girl darts one last look at Clarke, then bows deeply and scurries away.

The blonde is so stunned, she is unable to react when Ontari’s hand closes around her wrist and she is pulled outside. One of the guards closes shackles around her wrists and she is surrounded again, and marched away, the girl’s name her funeral dirge, howled by the unforgiving winds that crash against the citadel’s walls.

* * *

 

They drag her along endless corridors, into a cavernous hall filled with a cacophony of noises and smells that assault her senses after the quiet of the bath, and she sways slightly, a sense of displacement settling into her bones. The name Ontari uttered rings in her ears so loudly, it deafens her to any other sound. Her heart is tunneled by worms of doubt. She remembers clearly the day they had given Finn’s body to the pyre in TonDC and the Commander’s words about her dead lover. She had seemed earnest albeit distant, but now Clarke begins to wonder if she had really believed Costia dead, or conveniently discarded her, leaving her to the merciless hands of Azgeda in exchange for peace, just like she had done to her at the Mountain’s gates.

She seethes anew with burning anger, which warms her much more throughly than the glowing braziers scattered across the space to dispel the chill She lets her gaze wander about: torches bracketed to the walls at regular intervals give plenty, if irregular light. They hiss and drip with animal fat and its smell, added to that of food, sweat and spilled brews makes Clarke gag noiselessly. Her escorts are an island of calm in an ocean of madness, where half drunk warriors gorge themselves on sizzling meat and bitter ale, tables creaking under the weight of plates and carcasses. Packs of hunting dogs scurry under the tables, and between legs, begging for treats and those that dare get their glistening noses too close to the plates are mercilessly kicked away into the deeper shadows.

Nobody notices their entrance at first, but then a few warriors at the edge of the hall do, and elbowing their neighbors, point at her suddenly silenced. Soon enough she is in the midst of an ocean of faces, as she is marched between the tables, up to a low dais on which a throne is placed, carved in wood white as bone to resemble one of those ice giants that drift down the current from the farthest North. Azgeda’s leader stands as they approach, and after Ontari joins her on the dais, raises one hand for silence.

The soft murmurs filling the hall die down and the guards jostle Clarke around roughly, so that she too is facing the crowd. She feels Ontari’s hungry gaze travel down her spine, and sweat makes her shirt cling to dampened skin.

“My warriors!” the Ice Queen’s voice is etched with frosty triumph, “when I called you to this feast I promised you the instrument of the Commander’s undoing!” One of the guards kicks Clarke hard behind her knees and she folds down with a grunt, “look how _Wanheda_ kneels to me, let me show you how she bleeds!”

Clarke is grabbed by the chain connecting her cuffs and hauled towards a wooden pole she had not noticed before, overwhelmed as she had been by her surroundings and her whirring thoughts.

One of the men almost lifts her, securing the chain to a hook firmly planted at the summit of the pole and her arms are stretched painfully above her head, shoulders almost popping out of their sockets. She presses the front of her body against the pole for support and hisses in surprise when something pricks her chest, a move away from drawing blood. She bends her head down with some difficulty, and sees the surface of the pole, from chest height to thigh level, is coated in a shimmering paste of resin and glass shards.

At a signal she cannot see, strong hands rip the shirt open down her back, then tug at the chains experimentally. The warriors clamor for her blood, some shouting coarse suggestions at the sight of her bare back.

Breath hot like an open furnace tickles the nape of her neck and her jaw, heavy with the reek of mead and a woman’s voice mumbles words into her ear.

Clarke expects Ontari or the Queen, but it is someone unknown to her, the tone almost comforting even as the words are growled.

“Keep your mouth open or you will bite your tongue off. And scream.” She doesn’t know why she is offered advice, but she has no time to wonder further as a whip is uncoiled behind her with a sharp _crack_ that seems to split the air. She feels the wind of it caress her back, muscles clenching involuntarily, and as the instrument is dragged backwards across the floor in preparation for the first true blow, she glimpses bone chips nestled at its tips.

The crowd at her back seems to hold its breath, then the whip cracks anew like raging thunder and falls across her back full-force, her skin burning where the leather coils kiss it, the razor-like chips of bone nipping it open and tearing at the fat and muscle beneath. The force of the blow sends her rocking into the pole and her chest grinds onto the glass, adding pulsing pain to the fire devouring her back.  

The first scream is clawed off her tongue, and others soon follow as the whip descends like scorching rain, tearing her wounds open to the air, exposing white bone in the places where the flesh is thin. Sticky fluids drip down to soak into her breeches, and scarlet flowers of blood bloom onto her breasts, the little fabric still covering her in a mockery of dignity, quickly turning into a drenched rag.

Soon enough she is calling for her mother, and the more shameful heat of her piss trickles down her legs, pattering to the floor with her blood. Her bowels loosen and stench fills the air, but she is beyond caring, wild blue eyes fixed ahead. Shadows have appeared behind the Queen, of those she killed, come back from the afterlife to witness her punishment. Tears stream down her face, mixing with the snot and drool slicking her chin, and her howls melt into mad laughter. At the Queen’s stricken expression she can’t help but laugh all the harder, chest heaving with the effort.

_I deserve this._

The whip keeps falling.

**Author's Note:**

> TRANSLATIONS
> 
> Mochof: thank you  
> Fleim-vina: flame wine  
> Soujon: travel/journey  
> Gouthru Klir: safe passage  
> Palartok: quiet
> 
> A/N - the word wine does not exist in Trigedasleng, so I took another from a language I am familiar with (Czech) - vina is plural but sounds similar to wine and the sounds of the Grounders' language
> 
> In my head, while Trig is the language understood by all clans, Azgeda has some words that differ- palartok has the kind of harsh sound I was looking for. It belongs to the Eskimo- Aleut language family.


End file.
